The Kroger Hernando Marketplace Store, Mississippi's largest Kroger store, opened to great fanfare this past Wednesday, to the sounds of trumpets and a large contingent of the Hernando High School Marching Band.

The Kroger Delta Division and other store officials were on hand along with area veterans who were honored with special recognition, and longtime store manager Rickey Hayles who has recently retired, upon completion of his task of opening the store.

The sprawling new store, which resembles an indoor mall more than a grocery store with aisles of apparel and shoes, bed, bath and home decorations, and a kitchen section, complete with dinnerware, wine glasses, cookware and gadgets and appliances of just about every description, is just a few of the new features being offered by the grocery retail giant, founded in 1883.

The city's first-ever Starbucks, a small in-store restaurant and a butcher shop where the butchers will even grill a steak for you — to perfection — is another option at the new store.

The new Hernando Marketplace offers naturally-grown and produced local veggies, a deli and bakery, open-air seafood market with 45 varieties of fresh fish from around the world, pharmacy and brand new fuel center.

H. Montgomery Martin of Montgomery Martin Contractors, the construction firm in charge of building the new Kroger, finished ahead of schedule.

Robert Lee Long is Community Editor of the DeSoto Times-Tribune. He may be contacted at rlong@desototimestribune.com or at 662-429-6397, Ext. 252.

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(2) comments

@Old Man,Seriously? The old store was complete junk. They carried no product variety and the produce was always nasty and covered with fruit flies. The new store is 100x better, and so far, they appear to be keeping better looking produce around. I just hope they stick with it and don't slack off as time goes by

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